technology

Twitter: turning things upside-down

Posted by hil

I started out in the social web in the mid 90’s at bulletin boards and discussion forums. When my focus shifted to blogs, the comments in blogging generally seemed a poor substitute, more like guest books. There were exceptions of course, but they were still gardens in the conversation marketplace.

I had an idea today that Twitter is turning the relationship of blogging and commenting upside-down. Twitter is now a first stop central conversation marketplace, where the talk about blogs or the events of the day happens. Looked at socially, blogs, with their conversations followed clunkily in comments from blog to blog, or through aggregators, are not the main game anymore. Rather, they become more like important background material for what is talked about, and a form of identity.

Perhaps the essential drive to find real connection is serendipitously re-purposing micro blogging into the something closer to a satisfactory and more freewheeling conversation hub than other more calculated avenues have achieved so far. Perhaps FriendFeed and others will take it further.

FlickrFan for funerals?

Posted by hil

These days images are often shown at funerals. It is usually grainy old family photos looping on a roll-down portable screen. Imagine, instead, the church having a HDTV, and that you can stream chosen image feeds to it from your computer. If family and friends wanted to, they could contribute feeds that would become part of the source material for the screen display. This is one great use I can see for Dave Winer’s new product,  FlickrFan.

Used in a more private setting, its easy to see it being useful for family photo viewing and so on. I have reservations about it being used as a way to provide an ambience in one’s living room. I find image (and especially moving image) too arresting to treat as part of the background in a social situation, unless I’m inured to the footage. So it might either highjack conversation, or at the other extreme become like muzak. I also worry if it will be pitched by some as a great solution to having an acre of black flat screen in your lounge.  I think those big flat screens chew up a lot of energy, and to have them running a screen saver all the time only increases the energy usage. As far as the planet is concerned we have to be learning to turn things off more, rather than keeping them on in the background.

Pushing the envelope

Posted by hil

Amy writes about how Coke is at least making the right noises about respecting users wishes in relation to Facebook Beacon. Dave thinks Facebook was deliberately testing the waters. Of course leaking to test or dilute reaction has been a political tool for eons.

I’ve heard Roger Law, one of the creators of the famed satirical 1980’s TV puppet show Spitting Image talk about pushing the envelope of what is acceptable socially. He said that at that time in the UK, it was much more difficult to publish questionable material in the print media, whereas censorship was less strict and it was easier to get away with more on TV. He wondered if a reason might be that TV was taken less seriously. He added that if your show was successful, you could then be more audacious next time, even from week to week. I thought that was really interesting, and I’ve watched it happen since. The Chaser is an example; you couldn’t imagine them getting away with things like the APEC security breach or the Eulogy Song if they were new kids on the block. Think, too, how the excuser of the disastrous Lindsay fake political flyer, tried to palm it off as a ‘Chaser-style prank’ without understanding that tradition.

I guess the web is also somewhat differentiated from the older media with regard to pushing the boundaries of conventional feelings about privacy and social mores, and advertising within it is pushing the envelope in every which way it can, seeking new niches. I don’t want anything to do with Facebook’s advertising, and it is one of a number of reasons I remain somewhat aloof from FB. But I expect that what seems audacious today, the type of targeted advertising within social networks that Facebook (even if it has backtracked to an opt-in basis) has introduced, will become just like the furniture tomorrow, for better or worse. Chris Matyszczyk challengingly points out that this sits with a tradition, too.

Perfect avoidance

Posted by hil

I signed up to the local Freecycling mailing list today thinking it might be a good way to pass on some old household stuff. My heart sank when I saw it was a Yahoo groups list. I find Yahoo awkward to use – I seem to be asked to sign in at every click – and I avoid it like the plaque, apart from Flickr. I’ve opted for reading the list through it’s RSS feed, which seems the perfect avoidance solution. I’m the only subscriber in bloglines, kind of surprising since the group is several thousand strong.

What a difference an interface makes

Posted by hil

Recent revisions of news websites have changed my news reading habits. It used to be that my first ports of call were the Fairfax papers – The Melbourne Age and the Sydney Morning Herald . I would scan the ABC for the most up-to-date and factual reporting. Then a quick look at The Australian for a reality check on the the other side of politics, but mostly to check on Bill Leak’s daily cartoon.

ABC News is my now my first option. It’s not only that their page and usability is more attractive, its also that the Fairfax papers have become less attractive and harder to use. Their celebrity junk aspect seems even more prominent with the big strip of photos across the bottom of fold, the dark background that makes the main photo caption readable takes an annoying time to load, and the ads and changing video links are really distracting. I particularly despise the ads that zoom out and take over your screen. That’s when I walk away – you would think advertisers would know this by now! And the opinion and world pages are buried way down the page. The Australian website is improved, but its font is too small, and it also inflicts those zoom out ads on its readers, too.

The upshot: ABC is the main game. Fairfax for opinion pieces only. Bill Leak’s cartoon.

Go the ABC!

Posted by hil

The Australian Broadcasting Commission has again shown it’s willingness to adopt and make the most of new media with it’s shiny new ABC News site. It’s really cool – personalized tagging, great embedded video and audio, and an attractive interface, among other features.

Goodbye blue cable network, welcome wrlssgrrl

Posted by hil

network

I’ve been offline for a few days, the upshot being our house is now on a wireless network. Of course, there is still an orange and black tangle behind the tele where everything comes into the house to the set-top box. Funny to think that when we had the cable network put in seven years ago when we extended our house, it was the latest and best option. The blue cable has been great, but the wireless network is cool.

Wrlssgrrl looks like a friendly soul, don’t you think?:

Wireless router

I have lots of online catch-up reading to do now, but today I have to make a small and simple 1960’s liner.

TiddlyWiki

Posted by hil

TiddlyWiki, a ‘reusable non-linear personal web notebook‘, looks as if it offers lots of interesting possibilities. I’d like to try it out when I have some spare time.

(via Doc Searls)